In a new international and university funded research project we set to explore the untapped potential of urban alleys to boost resilience and community spirit in cities facing increasing risks from environmental and climatic challenges. The project, which spans Japan, Australia, and Taiwan, aims to transform these often-overlooked urban spaces into vibrant, functional parts of the cityscape.
Focusing on comparative analysis between Sydney, Taipei, and Tokyo, the study seeks to uncover how urban alleys can be redesigned to foster community engagement and enhance urban sustainability. By integrating innovative design strategies and community feedback, the project hopes to offer practical guidelines that could reshape Tokyo’s alleys into more inclusive and resilient public spaces.
The research will be supported by Senshu University and happen in form of a collaboration between different international research institutions in the three countries, emphasizing a mix of visual analysis and secondary data to craft tailored urban solutions.
The study will have several key goals, such as:
Enhancing Urban Resilience: To determine how alley redesign can contribute to a city’s ability to withstand and adapt to environmental and social challenges.
Promoting Sustainability: To explore sustainable urban design practices that utilize alleys for green spaces, waste management, and energy-efficient initiatives.
Increasing Community Engagement: To engage local communities in the redesign process, ensuring that the changes reflect their needs and enhance their quality of life.
Boosting Economic Opportunities: To examine how revitalized alleys can stimulate local economies by supporting small businesses, markets, and tourism.
Improving Public Health and Wellbeing: To create safer and healthier environments through improved alley designs that encourage physical activity and social interactions.
Preserving Cultural Heritage: To respect and incorporate historical and cultural elements of the alleys in the redesign, preserving the unique character of each city.
Encouraging Innovation in Urban Design: To use the project as a laboratory for testing new urban design ideas that could be applied to other parts of the city or exported to different urban settings.
Together with Lisa Woite we worked the last two years on an exciting research project dealign with the liminality of subcultural spaces in Tokyo and the changing urban situation of the city they are situated in. This is one of the first outcomes of this research project about liminal spaces in Japan and this time we are very happy to be a part of the special issue “Urban Borderlands: Difference, Inequality, and Spatio-Temporal In-Betweenness in Cities”, edited byDeljana Iossifova (University of Manchester) and David Kostenwein (ETH Zurich). Many thanks for all the critic, advice and support coming from peer-reviewers, colleagues and friends.
The paper is open access and available for download here:
The Liminality of Subcultural Spaces: Tokyo’s Gaming Arcades as Boundary Between Social Isolation and Integration
Heide ImaiFaculty of Intercultural Communication, Senshu University, Japan
Lisa WoiteDepartment of Imaging Arts and Sciences, Musashino Art University, Japan
The Kobe Fieldwork, conducted at the beginning of November 2023, aimed to examine the town planning mechanisms implemented by the city government to protect diverse communities and strengthen their resilience. Upon arrival, we commenced our visit to Mount Rokko, observing the city’s development since the 1995 Earthquake. Our exploration included the recovery process and a visit to the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake Memorial Museum, which featured a guided tour and a movie screening.
The following day, we delved into the history of the foreign settlement quarter and explored the local farmers market, renowned for its innovative approach to connect producers, consumers, and people from various backgrounds. The market, held every Saturday in a picturesque park, provided us with the opportunity to conduct interviews with over ten food stand operators, discussing their contributions to local farming, food security, and different recovery initiatives, as well as the establishment of local farm networks and distribution channels for wine, cheese, beer, and of course, vegetables. Additionally, we learned about collaborative workspaces, the utilization of akiya (vacant homes) for various purposes, startup promotions, and local tourism initiatives.
The field trip concluded with a comprehensive tour of the Kobe harbor development, which included visits to the Tadao Ando Children’s Library, the Kiito Design Centre, and the Atoa Complex, along with the newly developed Tooth Tooth Food Market and the iconic Kobe Sign. The Kobe Fieldwork provided the participants with a broad spectrum of experiences, from historical sites and cultural landmarks to insights into disaster management and recovery strategies. More fieldtrips will follow in 2024.
For some students it will be final semester and seminar work will be concluded resulting in diverse research projects related to urban sociology and cultural experiences. These projects encompass a wide range of topics and areas of investigation, including:
Urban Renewal and Gentrification: Students explore how urban renewal initiatives and gentrification are impacting the fabric of neighborhoods in Tokyo and other Asian cities, considering their effects on local communities, businesses, and cultural heritage.
Community Revitalization: Research projects delve into the efforts to revitalize local communities within urban settings. This might involve studying the role of local businesses, grassroots initiatives, and community engagement in driving revitalization.
Urban Planning and Development: Students investigate the urban planning strategies and development projects shaping the physical and social landscape of Tokyo and other cities. This could include an examination of transportation infrastructure, green spaces, and architectural design.
Cultural Diversity: Exploring the cultural diversity within urban environments is another avenue of research. This might involve studying cultural festivals, immigrant communities, or the influence of globalization on local traditions.
Everyday Life in the City: Projects also focus on the daily experiences of residents in urban areas, shedding light on routines, challenges, and opportunities. This could encompass studies of work-life balance, commuting patterns, and leisure activities.
Historical Perspectives: Some projects take a historical approach, tracing the evolution of urban areas and examining how past events and decisions have shaped the current urban landscape.
Comparative Studies: Comparative research could involve analyzing similarities and differences between Tokyo and other Asian cities, drawing out lessons and insights that can be applied globally.
These research projects aim to deepen our understanding of urban life, culture, and society, with a focus on Tokyo and its counterparts in Asia. Students apply sociological and ethnographic research methods to explore these topics, and their findings will contribute to broader discussions about the dynamics of modern cities. More soon about the upcoming results
Looking Back and Looking Forward: Community and Justice in Crisis
The Pacific Rim Community Design 2023 Sendai took place from 16-18 September 2023. At Day 1 all participants visited Futaba, a town erased by 3.11, the Futaba Disaster Museum and listed to the major and how the town tries to recover. He showed us around the derelict city hall where the time stood still and displayed the time of the event: 14.46pm at 3.11. Afterwards we had the opportunity to see one of the local elementary schools and how also here time stop suddenly when the triple disaster hit. Parents were able to pick up belongings some 7 years later, but some never did as the memory must have been too sad.
From former 6500 residents just 100 returned (09.2023) or moved here (e.g. newcomer) since the lifting of the evacuation order on 30 August 2022. Many areas near the destroyed coastal areas are mainly planned for work/shopping but not living or residential purposes (even though around the new JR Futaba station (which is located along the Joban line) new low rise housing is constructed at the moment, offering affordable and subsidied houses and apartments for rent).
Also many (new) companies settle in the area, some are still under construction, attracting even more companies as 70 percent of the construction cost can be covered by public funds. Newcomer who plan to settle in the town can receive 200man/ 16.000 Euro, returnees cannot receive this, which leads to more inner conflicts and shows how complex the situation is. Thanks to all who organized this tour, it was a very inspiring to see the development, even though the town might never recover fully.
On day 2 we visited the Tomioka Archive museum, its impressive installations which featured items which were collected from private homes (70 percents of the items on display) including clocks, calendars but also a wrecked police car which reminds the visitor of the tragedy of the triple disaster which caused so many death, not just immediately but also many years later (the Futaba museum mentioend a number of a total of 2337 disaster related death in Fukushima by 31 March 2023). Minachan who is working as story teller for a local NGO eventually joined us on a bus tour around Tomioka showing us the former shotengai (central shopping street), schools, station buildings and even the fundament of her own house which is she now rebuilding in Tomioka.
After lunch we visited the Tomioka winery which started 2014/2015 to plant vines to better use the area and create something for future generations. Three school friends (who are now in their 50s) came together, used their own land and funds to start the procedure and continue to realize the project with the help of crowdfunding and many volunteers to finally to suceed to produce 500 bottles per year (as of 2022). Most of the bottles go to the crowdfunders, volunteers and all people involved but they have high hopes to be able to sell wine very soon to the general public. More about their initiave can be found here: https://tomioka-wine.com/
Our final stop brought us to Namie Cafe and the Ocafe, which is the initiave of a former residents and other women to tell the stories of 3.11 and their survivor.s Oka-san rebuilt and opens her house as cafe to all who want to know more about the disaster which especially hit Namie town but also many other local communities so hard. We listed to three kamishibai stories, narrated by three amazing women who work effortless to create a local network to which we should listen to and learn from so that such disaster will not happen again. If you are in the area, give them a call, surely they are welcoming you: https://ocafe-utuwa.mystrikingly.com/
On monday all participants came together at the Tohoku Universitie’s International Research Institute of Disaster Science – IRIDeS together to discuss their impressions, listen to different researchers and finally to poster presentations who featured many new ideas. Many thanks to all the organizers for all the efforts, energy and time as they took months to prepare this event, lets not just talk but realize how to create livable communities.
Ocafe is growing 1000 Sakuratrees to give to schools and other groups
In May students started to prepare a new series of interviews for the upcoming screening of a documentary about everyday life and challenges in Tokyo’s neighbourhoods, this time focussing on Jinbocho, Kanda. The aim it is to highlight the challenges the residents and visitors face everyday to live and access this neighbourhood. This forms a unique chance for the students to conduct town walks and interviews at the same time, documenting their work and research not just in form of fieldnotes, visual sketches but also videomaterial which they can utilize to recall the fieldwork and support their findings.
As the work just started, the time of the screening and exhibition will be announced at a later date. More can be found here: https://heideimai.com/seminar-cities-culture-and-everyday-life-2022%e5%b9%b4%e5%be%8c%e6%9c%9f/
A recent fieldwork trip brought us to New York City, where we had the chance to walk and discover different neighbourhoods, present our recent research about global cities and creative clusters to a small audience and make new connections for upcoming projects.
What a fascinating city, which was hit hard by the pandemic, yet always seems to be able to rise like phenix out of the ash. So many facets, faces and feelings, so many communities, creativity and connections were made.
Some interviewees stated during our fieldwork that the people need a thick skin to survive in the city, especially people which belong to the creative sector. Is that the case also in other cities like Tokyo, London or Paris, and what does that mean for their daily life, practice and creative work? Many questions which we hope to answers with more in-depth data.
More can be found on the research and project website
The new semester has started already and for the very first time a new zemi is aiming to raise students’ concern over their mundane everyday lives in the modern city. It encourages students to explore the sociological implications of urban cultural experiences. This subject also strengthens students’ skills of planning, developing and carrying out social science research(es). Emphasis is given to current cultural issues, changes and developments going on in Tokyo and other Asian cities (Seoul, Hongkong, Shanghai, Taipei, Bangkok, Singapore) while taking global and regional factors into account. We will take up the challenge of demonstrating what, how and why we can learn from cities as Tokyo. To do so, we will study the hidden aspects of the city, discovering, remembering and re-telling the tales and everyday stories from the past to the present day.
Research projects will focus on the diversity of the Chiyoda-ku ward and other surrounding areas, and results of the group and individual fieldwork conducted will be featured here:
After some eventful weeks, a new semester is starting in April and we will be back in the classroom from next week F2F. I am not sure what will come out of this as the pandemic has still not ended, but several new courses and research projects have been set up and organized so students will hopefully learn a diversity of skills this academic year. Just a short but not complete list:
Course Area Studies Eastern Europe (with special attention given to Ukraine)
Course Environment and Culture
Course Urban Studies Seminar
Research Project: Urban Ethnographies and Narratives of Asian Cities
Research Project: Qualitative Methodology and Interviews with different Community Leader
All courses and results will be featured here over the next month:
We, a research team based at Senshu University Japan and University of Canberra, Australia, made a short survey to find out how outdoor activities and the use of different public spaces changed due to covid-19. The survey takes only 3-5min and we would appreciate all the help we can get, especially if you live in Japan. Many thanks in advance.
Special Issue: The present issue of Asian Studies is devoted to the investigation of the causes, effects, and ethical and ideological implications of the COVID-19 pandemic in Asia, particularly in East and South-East Asia. COVID-19 has had a dramatic impact on global societies. There have been enormous changes in the economy, lifestyles, education, culture, and many other aspects of social life (Caron 2021, 1). The COVID-19 pandemic has transformed societies, cultures, organizations, infrastructures, and many social services into a completely new reality. In this respect, the COVID-19 pandemic is without doubt a crisis of global proportions. Therefore, the whole of humanity should try to find a strategic solution to it, and to this end, the importance of intercultural dialog is manifested in a particularly clear and unambiguous way.
Paper Abstract: Different disasters throughout history have prompted Japan to develop diverse approach-es to recovery, revitalization, and local resilience. The current global COVID-19 pandemic is no exception. In this paper, we argue the need to study the impacts of COVID-19 on outside major cities such as Tokyo as such areas were already experiencing socioeconomic decline. Ishinomaki in Miyagi Prefecture is a city that has also been undergoing extensive post-disaster reconstruction after the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake (GEJE), nota-bly through various bottom-up approaches, often initiated by volunteers and migrants bringing new, creative ideas to community revitalization. These efforts continue to shape the social life of its residents during COVID-19, making Ishinomaki an important case study in both disaster reconstruction and rural revitalization. This paper examines exam-ples in which creativity played a key role in revitalization, recovery, and community re-silience in Ishinomaki over the last decade to shed light on current creative revitalization initiatives at the grassroots level, initiated and carried out by citizens. Drawing on an eth-nographic approach conducted remotely in the form of semi-structured interviews, the paper presents the personal narratives of a diverse range of residents and social networks committed to rebuilding the soft infrastructure that is often overlooked compared to hard infrastructure. The paper proposes suggestions for the future based on lessons learned from the past decade, and hopes to illuminate how Japan’s rural areas are adapting to a new normal in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
“On February 20, 2012, the death of a family of three people was reported from Saitama due to starvation – an elderly couple and their 39-year-old son. The family could not afford to pay the rent, and electricity had been cut off. Unable to pay for heating, hypothermia is also suspected to be the cause of their death”. This was a newsline in 2012 and one can ask how is this possible in such a wealthy country? How many people suffer from poverty in and how is it measured? Is the covid-19 pandemic worthening the situation, and if so how, for whom in what way and what are approaches to tackle the issues? What can 2020 teach us to improve the situation?
Some of the questions are answered in my recent chapter entitled “Poverty in a wealthy megacity: stories from Tokyo’s alleys after the bubble burst”, which appeared in the book “Handbook of Megacities and Megacity-Regions, Research Handbooks in Urban Studies series, edited by Danielle Labbé and André Sorensen.
Currently working on extended research reflecting on the worthening of poverty levels in 2020 and beyond, the topic will be updated continuously here, thanks for visiting:
In times of uncertainty, I think it is time to update you on some happy news and things happening in 2020:
Update 1:As of April 1st 2020 I will start a new tenured position as Associate Professor at Senshu Universities’ new Faculty of Intercultural Communication and I am more than looking forward to teach young, upcoming students who want to explore the world and widen their horizons, making our globe hopefully a better place. We need new innovative ideas, in Japan especially.
Update 2:We are happy to announce that our edited book “Asian Alleyways: An Urban Vernacular in Times of Globalization” (Amsterdam University Press, with Marie Gibert-Flutre) will be in print soon, but under the current circumstances we have to wait for the confirmation fo the official release date.
Update 3:We are happy to announce that our co-authored book “Creativity in Tokyo – Revitalizing a Matured City” (Palgrave Macmillan, with Matjaz Ursic), will be published soon and we will announce the publication date as soon as we know more. We think that especially this book will help Tokyo and Japan to discover new ways to approach current challenges, regardless of what will happen to Tokyo 2021 #beyond2020
Looking forward to see what else 2020 (apart from some journal papers) will bring, not just work-wise. If you want to collaborate in any way, please get in touch. Many thanks to you all, stay safe and strong.
Recently I was interviewed by my former student Mizuki Nakata for her research about professional migrant women in Japan, where she is aiming to understand what difficulties including for example isolation, exclusion and discrimination but also challenges as building up a social network, realizing some kind of work-life balance and finding the right niche in Japanese society, they faced and even overcame. As there are nowadays so many different kind of women in Japan, living, working, surviving but also thriving here, it will be important to see what kind of results the research will reveal and how it might help other women to take control of their own life, set goals, and make positive choices, or in other words, how can we empower women to change Japan from inside.
